mid '50s Fords; aftermarket power steering

[40cpe]

I'm looking at a couple of mid '50s Fords, trying to find a good trip car to keep the wife comfortable. I drove one with an aftermarket integral PS gearbox. It needed constant correction driving down the road, like the gearbox wouldn't center. I talked to another owner and he was less than enthusiastic about how it drives other than it steers easy. Is there something about these conversions that they are all that way? Maybe these didn't turn out well and are for sale. I sure don't want to pay for someone's mistakes and then have to find a way to correct them. One is a F100 kit according to the owner, the other one was bought like that and the present owner doesn't know where the box came from. Any advice about this setup is much appreciated.

[ragdol]

Are we talking car or truck? I put a rack in a '55 Crown, drove like a new car.

[40cpe]

I'm sorry, they are cars. I'm looking for positive or negative experience with the gearboxes with the power steering hydraulics built in. I assume you are taking about a rack and pinion steering gear?

[kb426]

I have noticed that if the pump is not the correct gpm that some are installing a limiter in line that corrects alot of the description you gave. I have a little exp. with that and it did help.

[Okiedokie]

Since I am in the middle of a 55 Sunliner build I have studied this a bit. I am using a Fatman rack and pinion set up on mine. There has been a lot of negative feedback on the setups you describe, not any recommendations that I have seen. That said, I think that it has to take some experimentation to achieve good front end alignment with all of these changes. I will bet that a good front end guy could make some improvements. If you look at the 52-59 Ford social forum on the HAMB and the 57fordsforever.com site you will find lots of info.

[UGLY OLDS]

What a lot of people miss with integral P/S boxes is that the box MUST be "centered" with the wheels pointing straight ahead...  If the sector is not centered, the power assist will always be trying to "assist" the steering box to turn in that direction....   IE: The steering will require CONSTANT correction while driving ....I remember pulling my hair out trying to correct a 1967 Galaxie wagon "pull" issue before I learned that ....    :oops:

Bob..

[papastoyss]

I have no experience w/ mid fifties Fords but Chevys from that era had little or no caster designed in so as to make manual steering easier.Lots of Tri five owners switch to aftermarket a frames that have 4 or more degrees of caster dialed in to make the steering less sensitive when adding p/s.. Also as another member pointed out too much p/s pump pressure will cause sensitive steering.